Mahindra To Offer Sub-£10,000 Electric Car In UK In 2016

Mahindra is readying to launch its e2o 2-door, 4-seat electric cars in UK.

The successor to the Reva / G-Wiz could appear on the market in the first quarter of 2016 and cost less than £10,000 ($15,500).

Moreover, it’s expected that the export version of e2o will be more capable than 50 mph and 75 miles of range.

e2o is now available in India, Bermuda, Bhutan and Nepal.

Pawan Goenka, Mahindra’s executive director and president said:

“We are thinking of building our own distribution network in the UK. We want to target the individual buyer – perhaps people who are looking to buy a second car in the sub-£10,000 range for short commutes and inner-city driving. We are not here to plug a technology gap, but a price gap.”

That makes great sense, many people are looking for a cheap to buy and cheap to drive second commuter car. Today this means something like the LEAF which isn’t particularly cheap. Releasing this car at this price point will put pressure on Nissan to update the LEAF to decent specs and/or lower the price.

Careful what you ask for. Don’t forget that the last generation G-Wiz EV was a veritable death trap that killed at least one EV pioneer. The G-Wiz literally disintegrates in crash-test videos with the passenger cell becoming a crumple zone. I can’t recall seeing any car perform worse than the G-Wiz in a crash test.

The last G-Wiz was exempt from safety regulations, because it was classified as a “quadricycle.” Will the new G-Wiz be classified as a car, and be required to meet the safety regulations for cars?

The fact that for past 4.5 years the G-Wiz (unchanged) has continued to be sold in the UK, speaks volumes about the British authorities and Mahindra. Fortunately, demand for the G-Wiz in the UK really dried up during that period.

The last generation didn’t meet EU safety standards for cars, so MP Boris Johnson (future governor of London) made the Ministry of Transportation reclassify it as a quadricyle so that it could be legally sold in the UK. What make you think it will be different this time around? It’s built for the Indian market where they are allowed to sell cars without any airbags, vehicle stability control, or anti-lock brakes.

From the link below:
“Before becoming Mayor of London Boris Johnson found himself in an environmental-friendly ‘road-rage’ experience last year when he discovered that the Department of Transport wanted to ban, via Brussels, as he put it the ” cleanest, greenest, sweetest four-wheeled self-propelled invention to hit the London streets since the first horseless carriage arrived at the end of the 19th century” – the G-Wiz electric car.”

“To the MP of Henley at the time, the British state had deemed the vehicle unsafe in a violent collision after tests and the then Minister for Transport Stephen Ladyman said the vehicle did not conform to EU regulations, [Johnson] calling for the car to be reclassified as a quadricycle.”

“As an ace test-driver for GQ magazine Johnson’s own experience of the G-Wiz refuted with the Government’s. He viewed the car being a ‘contraption’ to saving the planet that emitted the same amount of carbon as a small dandelion and no less or more dangerous than a bicycle.”

Fantastic news, heavy quadracycles are what is needed in the major cities in the uk. The WHO estimate 30,000 people a year die in the uk because of urban pollution big polluting SUV’s kill more than 10x more people than traffic accidents.

If you want a cutesy practical 2 seater, the SmartED is extremely low cost, being available ultimately I’m told by the local dealer depending on options/deals, for $12,000-16,000 when factoring in all incentives and tax credits…

It is a very safe, practical, fun to drive car. And in a collision you will usually live to talk about it.

The new car is a clean sheet design that has learned a lot of lessons from the old G-wiz (both good and bad). It has also been designed from the ground up to be an export vehicle able to meet European safety requirements, so I genuinely wouldn’t have any qualms about driving a European version.

I hope it does come over here as the EV boom has also meant that the big manufacturers have driven out the niche urban car brands, leaving us with a lot of choice, but all of it at the mid and high end of the market. The “electric dacia” is a good description of the e2o, and it is precisely what the market lacks right now.

That said, if it is to be successful over here it will need some changes to the current design.

* Mennekes charging socket (the Indian version uses 3-pin) for type 2 charging
* Chademo or CCS support, ideally Chademo. Not installed on Indian version
* Include 60:40 folding on rear seats
* Loose the spare wheel and go with puncture repair kit. Use space saved for a “frunk”. European markets don’t look for a spare anymore, but *do* like cargo/storage space.
* Make heater a heat-pump and include heated front windscreen along with power steering standard on all trim levels. Costs can be managed by deleting features not commonly included on base spec budget European cars like electric mirrors/windows/infotainment etc – Offering multiple trim levels would be a good way to broaden appeal.
* Top speed needs to be 130km/h. Real-world range needs to be at least 130km, ideally 160km. Possibility of offering two battery “sizes” should be considered.

Also, though I respect Mahindras ambition in setting up their own dealer network and going for the jugular over here, I would put that money in the war chest, and instead go with using the Ssangyong brand and dealer network and an aggressive marketing campaign. If the Ssangyong division pulls it’s finger out and makes a production version of the Tivoli EV concept, then it would make for a very convincing electric line-up for the Ssangyong marque, which currently has absolutely nothing.